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Deimos_
2009-02-20, 02:07 PM
Hello there GitP community. I come to you in search of advice and optimization for the adventure I am planning to run for my players. This might be a somewhat lenghty thread, please bear with me.

For my players: This is classified information and spoilered for you, please don't read it as it will ruin the surprise. And I shall eat your souls if you do. :smallsmile:

Intro and BG

Well, here's the thing guys. I have this really good trio of players, and so far I have DMed for them a couple of purely interpretative stand-alone adventures. Since they considered them fun, I want to now DM one 'for real', with full D&D 3.5 mechanics. Problem is, my skills with the numbers and rules are really not that hot. So because of that, the sheets might take a while to create. The thrill of creating and organizing the scenario for them is certainly worth it though. With the mechanics, there's that official feel.

I believe I have a really good concept, and I want help with the execution. The adventure I have in mind is based on H.P. Lovecraft's short story Shadow Over Innsmouth, which I think many playgrounders will be familiar with. I want it to be bleak and atmospheric, with an epic, very tough struggle at the end. Here's the raw story:

Coastal villages X and Y, neighbors since countless generations and quite unremarkable, subsisting on a fishing economy, little agriculture, and a 'sibling' relationship, with the populations having friendly relations, helping each other in time of need and the like, changed in the last few years.

A small island, just as unremarkable as the villages, just off the shore closer to village Y(let's call this one Mouthinns. Just temporarily), one day shows signs of activities, which the villagers sense in indirect forms, such as dreams and an unpleasant sensation regarding it. The only aspiring adventurer in Mouthinns, a young and impulsive bard, decides to go find out more about it, and after a quick reunion with X's most influential members of the community, he takes a boat, a couple of the stronger villagers, and goes for the island.

For weeks no news were heard of the bard, but things started to change. The feeling of wrongness regarding the island vanished, and most interestingly, the fishermen were very surprised to notice the fish started to get much more plentiful.

After a month, and when Mouthinns' fishermen were almost getting used to the great quantities of fish spontaneously swimming to the shore and crowding their nets, they noticed two figures coming out of the water. Surprised since they saw no boat, and even more surprised when they noticed one of the figures was monstrously fish-like, they stood ready for combat with harpoons and spears in hand. The human figure, who stood hidden by wet, heavy robes, revealed himself to be the bard the villagers sent to the island. Waving his arms like a madman and much more emphatic than the villagers recognized him, he explained the fish monster as a kuo-toa and a follower of Father Dagon. As the monster smiled wickedly the bard counted the stories of underwater glory, power hidden beneath the waves and the enlightenment the deep sea cults inspired him. The fishermen, already impressed even if the bard showed signs of being unstable, widened their eyes even more when the kuo-toa brought to their eyes a beautiful holy symbol made of gold, composed of five tentacles forming a distorted starfish. As it handed the valuable object to the nearest fisherman, they noticed the glow of gold in their nets, and all over the sand and waves around them on the beach, as if they were there all along. Rushing to pick up the monstrous fishes, tentacles and hideous aquatic faces engraved and molded on the gold, the fishermen were overcomed by greed and promises of even greater riches by the bard and his companion, along with an infinite supply of fish. All they needed in return was the worship of the glorious Dagon, the Lord of the Depths.

The preaching and conversion of Mouthinns continued, and with each lesson and each valuable artifact Mouthinns isolated itself from it's neighbor. The village of X knew little of what happened, since they weren't contacted by the Cult. Frustrated of being ignored by their neighbor and even more frustrated when Mouthinns became almost hostile to X's villagers, closing it's gates and it's houses to anyone but kuo-toas and Dagon's cultists. The small local Istishia church was replaced by the Esoteric Order of Dagon, the ones who weren't faithful conveniently disappeared, left for X, or were too afraid of the already too large influence of the cult to do anything. And the faithful were numerous, controlled and fanatical. The gold artifacts weren't traded but stockpiled, the villagers sacrificed or worse by the kuo-toa in Dagon's name for summoning of deep sea horrors and Abyssal ocean beasts.

That is the raw backstory, prone to change.

As you may have noticed, it has a lot of similarities with A Shadow Over Innsmouth.


The Adventure

Though I didn't think about the reason they are there yet, X called for adventurers to investigate Mouthinns situation. The inhabitants in X care for their companion village even if they've been shunned, and know something is up to no good in there. Little do they know WHAT it is, though. Then they contacted the three adventurers.

I plan on this being a high-level adventure, with the final enemy being no less than Father Dagon himself. The character levels will be probably level 17, with a level up to face Dagon.

Three level 17 adventurers, then. The encounters will be as follows, chronologically:

1 - NPCs. The PCs find X's cozy tavern and the villagers there explain the reason they were called. A former Mouthinns fisherman explains the BG to them, though not very detailed at all. PCs leave X when they deem appropriate to go deal with Mouthinns. The short road to Mouthinns won't have any random encounters, only the smell of rotten fish and salt becoming almost overwhelming as they get closer to what appears to be a ghost town, with palisade walls decaying and deserted streets with decrepit houses, unblinking eyes appearing to be observing you from the half-closed windows, only to disappear when you look at that direction. All this decadent atmosphere.

2 - The PCs start to hear something other than the sea breeze whistling. An insane voice sings what appears to be a sinister children lullaby. Following the sound they find the ancient-looking former church of Istishia, now converted to the twisted cult of Dagon. "Esoteric Order of Dagon" is written in Aquan, Kuo-toa and Abyssal on the front door. As they open the door, the song becomes louder as it echoes on the church's walls. Standing in the middle of the building, which is filled with the gold artifacts of kuo-toa, is the Mouthinns bard(a Thrall of Dagon PrC Bard), guarded by two low-to-mid level kuo toa clerics. Spot checks reveal behind them are a smaller pile of the most well crafted artifacts. Noticing the PCs, the Thrall will probably try to convert them. I believe they won't fall for it. If they do not convert, a fight ensues.

3 - Now I'm not too sure. I'll probably make the fisherman NPC come after the PCs kill the two kuo-toa and the Thrall, to warn them the cult is planning something really big. Bigger than their usual sacrifices. The town is more deserted than usual(he knows because he still comes there from time to time to spy on his home town; he has a good grasp of what generally is going on), and the island is emitting that invisible sickly aura of wrongness again. Somehow he leads the PCs to the shore, and to a boat. They are supposed to go to the island.
As they reach the island by boat(without fisherman, I'm thinking), a crazed Kraken attacks them. The creature was lured by the ritual to the aquatic demon.

4 - Now stuff gets interesting. In the opposite side of the small island, the ritual is taking place. Two mid-to-high level kuo-toa clerics, a mid-to-high level kuo-toa rogue, a mid-to-high level kuo-toa barbarian, and an Aspect of Dagon are systematically slaying villagers and kuo-toa cultists, in a terrible orgy of sacrifice, chants and evil summoning spells. One of the clerics is standing by an altar, awaiting for the Thrall and for the sacrifices to be sufficient. A Spot check reveals the scroll on top of the altar. The PCs might attack or not, and I'll roll stuff to see if the cult notices them. Eventually they will fight, with or without surprise round. It'll be a tough fight I believe.

5 - As the PCs defeat the clerics, barbarian, rogue and aspect, the rites were still sufficient to open an Abyss portal. As the rift to Shadowsea, home of Father Dagon, opens, a Wastrilith demon, favored minion of Dagon, arises from it. Fight ensues. :D

6 - The PCs have defeated the Wastrilith. Not sure how I will handle this, if they can't close the portal or if a surviving kuo-toa casts the advanced Gate spell on the scroll(that is to summon Dagon), or if the mid-to-high level cleric survived to make the casting... thing is, Dagon is coming. The PCs, at this point, will gain a level making them level 18. I also want them to be fully rested before Dagon makes his appearence, with buffs and everything. It'll be an 'impossible' fight, as the demon lord is a CR 22 foe. The feeling of hopelessness at this point, I believe, should be pretty Lovecraftian.

Dagon arises from the portal, it's infinite tentacles, hideously deadly claws, and the sheer wrongness of it's form and existance threatening the very sanity of the adventurers. Oh boy. Final Fight.


Numbers

Well, here are the stats then...

Three level 17 adventurers, as mentioned, will face before Dagon:

First - An human Bard/Thrall of Dagon with quite a bit of levels. Thrall of Dagon prestige class is detailed on Dragon Magazine #349, and btw, that article, the Demonomicon of Iggwilv focused on Dagon, helped me immensely.

Two low-to-mid level kuo-toa clerics of Dagon. Domains of Dagon are Chaos, Entropy, Evil and Water.

Second - Kraken with enhanced HD.

Third - Two mid-to-high level kuo-toa clerics, a mid-to-high level kuo-toa rogue, a mid-to-high level kuo-toa barbarian and an aspect of Dagon. Weakest here is probably the aspect, with only a CR 9 before HD advancements. He is found on the Web Enhancement of the Fiendish Codex I, on the wizards site. But the kuo-toa party might be too hard. I do want a kuo-toa barbarian called Glubglub though.

Fourth - Wastrilith. Fiend Folio. CR 18, will be probably the toughest thing before Dagon.

Fifth - Dagon as described by the Fiendish Codex I. CR 22. Oh my. I'm not sure if you guys are familiar, but he has grappling goodies with his tentacles, constrict, and when the PCs first see him they must make Will saves to preserve sanity. The saves might be too much, Dagon might be too much... I'm not sure how to balance this.

I did some pretty extensive research for this adventure, using besides Core the Fiendish Codex, Dragon #349, Fiend Folio, web enhancement for FC I, and research on Dagon goodness. The epic level 30 Dagon on Dragon will probably be used on his home layer on Shadowsea in a possible part II of the adventure.

Damn, that's a lot, I know. Some information will probably be confusing, so let me know if further detail is needed... how to fill the gaps? How to conduct this? Is it too railroaded? Is the plot too forced? Some might complain because Dagon is too powerful for such a measly summoning, but I'm thinking of making it more like a mistake, an exception. To fit the "horrors that should not be awaken, and are not meant for this world" thing. So, why Dagon didn't just ignore the poor attempt at summoning by a small cult on the material plane? Who knows. These little guys got what they wanted, and the means don't matter as much as what they unleashed. I don't know if this is a reasonable explanation. I try.

Advice, guys? I thank you in advance. I'm aware that is a lot to read, I apologize for that and thank you for your interest if you went through it all.

I believe I should stress again that I'm not very good with game mechanics. Advice on making that simpler and not delay too much this adventure(which we'll do on MSN) will be most welcome.

Keld Denar
2009-02-20, 02:29 PM
Ok, I read through most of it, and skimmed the rest, but something caught my eye that I think needs to be adressed. You as a DM and your players all sound rather inexperienced. High level play is messed up. If even one of your players wants to play a full caster (which they will probably need to take on the likes of Dagon) then you are looking at a MASSIVE investment of time for an inexperienced player just to learn how to do 1/2 of the things they are capable of doing by that point. It sounds like a neato idea, but would be something better run at about ECL6-8, which is a great place for a low-mid experienced party to play. You, or someone here, could easily stat down Dagon to be a challenging encounter for a party of that level without requiring you to play at that kind of inflated level. Seriously, high level play is insane.

As far as encounters go, head over to www.d20srd.com and check out the EL calculator. Then go read the section in the DMG about encounter levels and encounters/day. Generally, a party can handle 3-4 encounters with an EL ~ their level per day. Or 2ish encounters at EL +2, or one at EL +3 to +4, depending on the strenght of the encounter (not all encounters are created equal, CR and EL are pretty broad most times).

This will give you a lot better idea of what your party may be able to handle. Also, CRs are typically intended for 4 players. 3 players lack a whole action per round that a 4 person party has. You should keep this in mind when setting encounters.

Deimos_
2009-02-20, 02:56 PM
Humm. I see your point. If I made a lower level adventure though, Dagon probably would be excluded.

None of the players are into heavy cheese though. If I tell them to don't overpower their characters, they most likely won't. But I see what you mean; apart from that, high level play is still complicated. I might do some minor adventures with lower levels then, to get used to it.

BRC
2009-02-20, 02:59 PM
Here is an idea, do a couple low-level adventures with these characters, just to get used to to the system. Then, once you feel comfortable with it, you timeskip to when the PC's are level 17, and get ready to kick some Dagon.

PinkysBrain
2009-02-20, 03:09 PM
The fun of getting to high level is mostly from the changes from lower level ... but it's undeniable that things get a bit wonky in the high teens. Especially for what is close to a one shot with only a single level up wouldn't it be better to stick closer to the lower level ranges?


Standing in the middle of the building, which is filled with the gold artifacts of kuo-toa, is the Mouthinns bard(a Thrall of Dagon PrC Bard), guarded by two low-to-mid level kuo toa clerics. Spot checks reveal behind them are a smaller pile of the most well crafted artifacts.
Unless they are goody two shoes there is a chance that the moment they detect evil and they see shinies they just start blasting ...

As they reach the island by boat
Why would high level adventurers travel by boat?

As the PCs defeat the clerics, barbarian, rogue and aspect, the rites were still sufficient to open an Abyss portal.
It's a bit cliche ... can't the high level kuo-toa cleric in an act of desperation just sacrifice himself to give an explanation for the curious timing of the success of the ritual (ie. a higher level sacrifice works better than a lower level one). Give him some protection to make sure he doesn't get one shot early in the fight (Cube of Force is a pretty good protection from damn near everything, prismatic sphere too ... but with cube of force they can see what's happening).

The feeling of hopelessness at this point, I believe, should be pretty Lovecraftian.
As long as the PCs think they can really win there is nothing Lovecraftian about it. So they have to feel like their failure is certain and that their failure would also doom the world (ie. there should be no Elminster to cover their asses). I'd say make the gate one which gets ever larger, and after a while have only part of the monster (mostly tentacles) come out of the gate and start killing remaining villagers (maybe some prison pens full of children or something). Have him be completely impervious to any and all attacks and have the only way to stop his rampage be the temporary closure of the gate somehow (use the scroll to give them a way to close the gate and know the effect is only temporary).

Deimos_
2009-02-20, 03:32 PM
The fun of getting to high level is mostly from the changes from lower level ... but it's undeniable that things get a bit wonky in the high teens. Especially for what is close to a one shot with only a single level up wouldn't it be better to stick closer to the lower level ranges?


Unless they are goody two shoes there is a chance that the moment they detect evil and they see shinies they just start blasting ...

Why would high level adventurers travel by boat?

It's a bit cliche ... can't the high level kuo-toa cleric in an act of desperation just sacrifice himself to give an explanation for the curious timing of the success of the ritual (ie. a higher level sacrifice works better than a lower level one). Give him some protection to make sure he doesn't get one shot early in the fight (Cube of Force is a pretty good protection from damn near everything, prismatic sphere too ... but with cube of force they can see what's happening).

As long as the PCs think they can really win there is nothing Lovecraftian about it. So they have to feel like their failure is certain and that their failure would also doom the world (ie. there should be no Elminster to cover their asses). I'd say make the gate one which gets ever larger, and after a while have only part of the monster (mostly tentacles) come out of the gate and start killing remaining villagers (maybe some prison pens full of children or something). Have him be completely impervious to any and all attacks and have the only way to stop his rampage be the temporary closure of the gate somehow (use the scroll to give them a way to close the gate and know the effect is only temporary).

Well, it works if they start blasting the Thrall and the two clerics. Instead of initially trying to convert them, he will gloat the whole fight, praising Dagon and such. The Thrall is there with the kuo-toa to gather the most valuable artifacts to aid in the summoning.

Point taken on traveling by boat. In that case, the kraken could attack when they are on the village beach and not yet on the island, so the only encounters on the island are the cult, the wastrilith and Dagon.

Good idea with the kuo-toa high level cleric.

The Lovecraftian feel I was hoping to make is the perspective of facing this abject, incredibly old, incredibly powerful Demon Lord, with his mere presence causing possible madness, and the failure of the PCs being very much likely(as the encounter is very difficult). Being the object of worship of the kuo-toa they just faced and master of the demons they had a hard time killing should add to it. But of course, they are supposed to stand a chance since they are high level and have some means of facing it. So yes, I can see why it doesn't feel very Lovecraftian...

Thanks for the help you guys are giving me.

Deimos_
2009-02-21, 05:51 PM
Any more input is welcome.